Sheet feeding or delivering – Feeding – Separators
Reexamination Certificate
2002-02-21
2003-11-25
Walsh, Donald R. (Department: 3653)
Sheet feeding or delivering
Feeding
Separators
C271S104000, C271S117000, C271S109000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06651974
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a sheet feed apparatus and a recording apparatus which is equipped with the sheet feed apparatus. More particularly, the present invention relates to the sheet feed apparatus which separates sheets stacked on a sheet stacking means one by one and transports the separated sheets to an image recording unit, and the recording apparatus which is equipped with this sheet feed apparatus.
2. Related Background Art
Conventionally, a recording apparatus such as a printer, a copying machine, a facsimile machine or the like is ordinarily equipped with a sheet feed apparatus which feeds sheets to an image recording unit. As such the sheet feed apparatus, there is the structure that an inclined plane member is provided at the end on the downstream side of a sheet feed direction of a sheet stacking means, and the inclined plane member is set to come into contact with the sheets fed by a sheet feed means, whereby the sheet is separated one by one.
FIG. 22
is a schematic diagram showing the conventional sheet feed apparatus which applies a system of separating the sheet by using such the inclined plane member. In
FIG. 22
, numeral
215
denotes a sheet feed roller which acts as the sheet feed means, and numeral
214
denotes a sheet feed arm which rotatably holds the sheet feed roller
215
at its end and which is also rotatably held by an arm shaft
214
a.
Numeral
210
denotes a sheet feed cassette which acts as the sheet stacking means on which sheets (or recording paper) P are stacked, and numeral
219
denotes an inclined plane member which comes into contact with the sheets P fed by the rotation of the sheet feed roller
215
and is thus used to separate the sheets P one by one. The inclined plane member
219
is provided at the end on the downstream side of the sheet feed direction of the sheet feed cassette
210
.
Then, an uppermost recording sheet P
1
fed by the sheet feed roller
215
is separated from the sheets P by the inclined plane member
219
, and then transported to a not-shown image recording unit through a sheet transportation path R. At this time, it is desirable to set the height of the inclined plane member
219
high so that the sheet P
1
fed by the sheet feed roller
215
passes the sheet transportation path R as it changes the direction upward along the inclined plane member
219
.
Incidentally, in such the conventional sheet feed apparatus and the recording apparatus equipped with it, the sheet feed cassette
210
is detachably installed in the main body of the apparatus. If the sheet feed roller
215
comes into contact with the sheet feed cassette
210
when the cassette
210
is installed and released, the sheet feed roller
215
and the sheet feed cassette
210
might be damaged, whereby it is necessary to limit the height of the sheet feed cassette
210
, and thus the height of the inclined plane member
219
is limited.
However, if the height of the inclined plane member
219
is limited as above, the sheet P
1
fed by the sheet feed roller
215
passes the sheet transportation path R as it changes the direction upward along the inclined plane member
219
when the number of the sheets P stacked on the sheet feed cassette
210
is small. However, when the number of the sheets P stacked on the sheet feed cassette
210
is large, since the sheets P do not so change the direction even if the sheets P come into contact with the inclined plane member
219
, the sheets P come into contact with a guide
220
constituting the sheet transportation path R at a sharp angle.
Then, if the sheets P come into contact with the guide
220
at such the sharp angle, the problems that the sheet can not be fed, the edge of the sheet is folded, and the like occur.
Further, there is a sheet feed apparatus which is equipped with a sheet stacking unit to stack the sheets thereon, a sheet feed unit to feed the sheets stacked on the sheet stacking unit to the downstream side of the sheet transportation direction, a sheet separation unit provided on the downstream side of the sheet stacking unit to separate the sheet fed from the sheet feed unit, and a sheet turnabout path to convert and guide the transportation direction of the sheet fed from the sheet stacking unit.
The sheet feed unit pushes the sheets on the sheet stacking unit against the sheet separation unit as feeding them, separates the sheets one by one, and then feeds the separated sheets to the sheet turnabout path. The sheet turnabout path guides the sheet, e.g., by ax making U-turn, to an image recording unit.
The purpose of U-turn transporting the sheet is to deal with the miniaturization by arranging the image recording unit above the sheet stacking unit to shorten the horizontal dimensions of the image recording unit and reduce the setup area of the recording apparatus.
However, if the sheet is U-turn transported like this, the problem that the height of the recording apparatus increases because the height of the sheet feed apparatus increases occurs.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
An object of the present invention is to provide a sheet feed apparatus in/from which a sheet feed cassette can be installed/released without any contact with a sheet feed roller, and which can surely feed sheets without any fold of their edges, and a recording apparatus which is equipped with this sheet feed apparatus.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a sheet feed apparatus of which the height is low, and a recording apparatus which is equipped with this sheet feed apparatus.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide a sheet feed apparatus comprising: a sheet stacking means, being able to be installed in and released from the main body of the apparatus, for stacking sheets; a sheet feed roller for feeding the sheets stacked on the sheet stacking means; and plural inclined plane members, disposed at the end of the downstream side of a sheet feed direction of the sheet stacking means, for coming into contact with the sheets fed by the sheet feed roller to separate them, wherein, among the plural inclined plane members, the height of the inclined plane member corresponding to the sheet feed roller is set to be lower than the height of the other inclined plane members.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide a sheet feed apparatus comprising: a sheet stacking means for stacking sheets; a sheet feed roller for feeding the sheets stacked on the sheet stacking means; plural inclined plane members, disposed at the end of the downstream side of a sheet feed direction of the sheet stacking means, for coming into contact with the sheets fed by the sheet feed roller to separate them; and a reversal roller for reversing the sheet fed by the sheet feed roller, wherein the reversal roller has plural roller units, and each of the plural roller units is disposed between the inclined plane members in a sheet width direction.
REFERENCES:
patent: 5540427 (1996-07-01), Nitta et al.
patent: 5725319 (1998-03-01), Saito et al.
patent: 6042109 (2000-03-01), Klausbruckner
patent: 6065886 (2000-05-01), Embry et al.
patent: 6170817 (2001-01-01), Kawaguchi
patent: 6279897 (2001-08-01), Richards
Kawarama Makoto
Onishi Toshiyuki
Joerger Kaitlin S
Walsh Donald R.
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